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Hello Food Rescue Friends,
Traveling recently with my daughter and listening to the radio, I decided to let her out of “80′s music jail”, and we found a song we could agree on. She turned it up, and we started singing rather loudly, “Oh, this has gotta be a good life, this has gotta be a good life, this could really be a good life………” Music can touch the soul at any given moment, and those lyrics in the context of the joy a father has at any given moment with a daughter kind of made me stop and think, “yes, this is the good life.”
Later that evening, I recalled a story I heard at a conference this summer from Wes Stafford, president of Compassion International. The story juxtaposed with the song lyrics my daughter and I sang caused me to reflect upon what the “good life” is really all about. Wes visited a man in Uganda released from prison, whose crime was his refusal to stop preaching. He was released after 2 miraculous public execution failures which apparently spooked the local government enough to release him. At the conclusion of their visit, Wes told him that people in America would be praying for him, to which the man responded, “tell the people in America I will be praying for them as well”. Wes inquired why he would pray for people in America, and the man responded, “I am told in America, people do not need God every day because there is so much. I can’t imagine how it is possible to not need God every day.”
So what really is “the good life?” Is it “When you’re happy like a fool”, as One Republic says, or is it to “need God every day” as the released prisoner in Uganda indicates? Perhaps the better question is which one is more sustainable? As we fulfill our mission to feed children and families with surplus food, it is easy to believe that the charitable transaction is only about providing relief for the recipients, but it’s impossible to directly engage helping families dealing with poverty without acknowledging your own relative lack of need, and subsequent thoughts of, “I am very fortunate”, which can be code for I am living “the good life”. But maybe we are just “happy like a fool”.
For each person involved with Food Rescue sacrificing time, talent, and treasure, I pray that the sacrifices you are making are leading you to a deeper need for God each day this holiday season, as in the end it is the only “good life” that is sustainable in all circumstances.
Best Regards,
John Williamson
Food Rescue Executive Director
jw@foodrescue.net
